Consider the misquote. It lies in that same realm as citing fake news or reading only the headline. Misquoting is certainly nothing new, but the internet allows a fake quote to be retweeted a thousand times before the truth has even clicked send.

I’ve written about this before, of course. In the summer of 2015, I wrote a blog post called Six Things Hemingway Never Said, in which I listed a series of fake, inaccurate, misappropriated, or apocryphal Hemingway quotes and their origins.

“Live. Laugh. Love”

Since then, of course, it has only gotten worse. Consider the following list of quotes, provided by Google when one searches for ernest hemingway quotes:

I won’t catalogue all of these, but let’s say that they range from context-free to paraphrased to nonsense. The seventh is a misquote of a line he said during a famous article by Dorothy Parker in The New Yorker, while the last one on the list sounds like the social media status update of a moody teen.

Why do we misquote?

What is it about the internet and misquoting? What drives one to repeat something that someone else said without bothering to make sure that person said it? Why would you put something on your Facebook wall, why tweet it, why make it into a cute photo for Instagram without confirming that, yes, it’s a real quote?

I think people misquote for two reasons, always working together: a) they think something sounds smart, cool, or profound, and b) they’re lazy or careless. There is no reason to misquote something or someone unless you just really don’t care enough to try, or don’t care enough to be accurate.

For me, there is one example that stands above all and infuriates me, because it’s the monstrous mutation of two real quotes, two beautiful quotes:

“We are all broken. That’s how the light gets in.”

I can’t remember where I first saw this, and whether it was attributed to Cohen or Hemingway, but I immediately knew it was nonsense because I recognized the first sentence as the lost child of a Hemingway quote, and the second half as a piece of a Leonard Cohen lyric.

Of course, here’s the real Cohen, from “Anthem”:

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.

And the real Hemingway, from A Farewell to Arms:

If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.

Lucky for us, I’m not the only person who cares about this. Google we are all broken thats how the light gets in and you’ll find the first link is to a Quote Investigator article about this misquote and its origin, including how the two quotes rose and converged.

But here’s what bothers me, seeing this nonsense quote getting bandied about while the truth is in position one of Google: This means that, these days, every time someone shares this particular misquote, they have not bothered to check its veracity on even the laziest level.

Oh, but does it matter, you ask? How many people are actual repeating this nonsense?

“I mean,” Ernest Hemingway said, “grace under pressure.”

That brings me to the point which I have been trying to reach all this time: Ernest Hemingway’s definition of courage–his phrase that, it seems to me, makes Barrie’s “Courage is immortality” sound like one of the more treble trilling of Tinker Bell. Mr. Hemingway did not use the term “courage.” Ever the euphemist, he referred to the quality as “guts,” and he was attributing its possession to an absent friend.

“Now just a minute,” somebody said, for it was one of those argumentative evenings. “Listen. Look here a minute. Exactly what do you mean by ‘guts’?”

“I mean,” Ernest Hemingway said, “grace under pressure.”

That race is his. The pressure, I suppose, comes in, gratis, under the heading of the Artist’s Reward.

-Dorothy Parker, The New Yorker

Is it too difficult to read such a long excerpt? Does it not make a good ankle tattoo? Is it too long to tweet?

Arguably the last man to rock a fedora with grace.

There are so many good books to read in this world and so much good music to listen to. There are so many people to meet, things to see, things to do. Think of how much better the world could be if we slowed down and started listening to one another. Think of how much better things would be if no one misquoted Leonard Cohen and everyone listened to his music.

The choice is yours. Are you going to be part of the problem? Or are you going to start checking the accuracy of quotes before you repeat them?

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26 Comments

Thank You!!!! I HATE when people attribute quotes to the wrong people. Or even worse don’t give anyone any credit at all- basically implying that they wrote it themselves. There’s really no reason why people cannot give credit to the real author.

I read the “quote” on Instagram today. By Cohen. I listened to the song and now I wanted to share it as well. I found the other one by Hemingway and I was searching which book does it come from. And I found this article. Thank you!

Thank you for the article, it’s really helpful! Could you help me with this quote?
“The best people possess a feeling for beauty, the courage to take risks, the discipline to tell the truth, the capacity for sacrifice. Ironically, their virtues make them vulnerable; they are often wounded, sometimes destroyed.”
I see this one everywhere on the internet, and I’m really curious: is it real or another misquote? Does it really come from “The Letters of Ernest Hemingway”?

Hi Flora – I dug around and can’t find anyone else who has attempted to verify this one. “Letters of Ernest Hemingway” is pretty vague, and could easily have been tacked onto this quote when an actual source couldn’t be found (or didn’t exist.)

However, I’ve believed that quotes were fake before that turned out to be legitimate, so I don’t want to say it’s definitely a misquote without doing further research. The one other reason I suspect it might be a misquote is because it seems to be a mash-up of some of his other famous passages. I also question whether Hemingway would’ve used a semi-colon or if he would have opened a sentence with the world “ironically.”

So I’m leaning toward no, but there’s an outside chance it is real and in a collection of letters out there somewhere.

I understand the problem with misquoting, but I happen to appreciate this bastardization of the Hemingway quote: “Life breaks everyone, and afterward some are stronger at the broken places.” To me (a person who perceives himself as having been broken–in combat and in love, to name a couple of ways), there is beauty and truth in that misquote. So what is the solution? To simply abandon the thought? To attribute it to myself? To attribute it by saying something like, “misquoted from Hemingway?” I don’t think the solution is to simply abandon the thought, or to be denied the ability to share it. In a sense I have taken Hemingway’s idea, as expressed in his original quote, and made it personal to me. There should be a way for me to legitimately think the thought and share it without being derided as either a plagiarist or a misquoter of Hemingway.

Maybe Hemingway wouldn’t be as upset as you seem to be about a reader modifying his ideas to make them personal.

I think there is middle ground here. The original line of “The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places” is not terribly different from the varied version you like. I agree that you can’t abandon the thought, especially if it’s one you find strength in.

The most important thing here, in my opinion, is that you know the distinction between the original quote and the quote you have a personal connection to. If you were to tattoo the misquote on your body or hang a plaque of it on your wall, you wouldn’t be doing so out of ignorance, but out of intention.

I can’t say what Hemingway would think about people misquoting him. But like most writers, he’d probably appreciate people like you who took the time to read his work and have thoughtful conversations about it.

I was googling Hemingway quotes tonight because I find him especially intriguing. I saw the one about we are all broken that’s how the light gets in. Myself being far from a literary brain thought wow that does not sound like Hemingway. I looked into it and came across this article. I absolutely loved every word of it!!! Social media has really made it so easy for people to remain ignorant and oblivious. No one fact checks anything “it was on Facebook so it must be factual”. So yes there are others like you that it matters to. Thank you!!!

I keep seeing misquotes from Presidents that are created obviously to fuel islamaphobia and racism, but hidden within this “quote” from 1800s so no one sees the fake quotes for what they are and just keep sharing sharing sharing… thanks for the article. It’s a relief to know others feel this way.

It’s just a bunch of inspiring words, who cares about who said them first?

I find it quite ridiculous that you compare the impact of inspirational misquotes to fake news. Fake news can easily have a country plummet into utter chaos, I doubt the same is true for the difference between cracks making you stronger or letting light in that makes you stronger…

If the creator of a quote is alive and cares about it, he/she can make an effort to clear it up (as some people who got misquoted have done!), if they are dead they can’t care anymore anyways.

In the end, what matters is that the message enriched someone’s life, no matter if it was a famous author, a famous singer, or just “random internet person #8473” who created it.

I gather quotes I like from anywhere, be it Goodreads, random forum signatures on the internet or T-Shirt prints of strangers I pass by. And I’ve always made it a habit to not write down who supposedly or rightfully said them, because it doesn’t matter. If anything, people will try to use a big and famous name to sway someone’s opinion, so let’s just drop the names in general. Focusing too much on the people instead of their works tends to just lead to less pretty parts of their lives that they wouldn’t want to be remembered for anyway.

well done on de-bunking this and other trite bunkum. As a reader and fan of Ernest Hemingway and a fan and student of the sheer depth of Leonard Cohen’s writing its a matter of considerable relief to find well-meaning intelligent people putting right the wrongs of the lady interneterati.
As a wise man once said, “You can’t believe EVERYTHING you read on the internet” (Abe Lincoln, Gettysburg, 1863)

Thanks, this changes everything! I’ve been making those silly cards with quotes (no interest in Pinterest) without ever challenging the authenticity. I was looking for the origin of “how the light gets in” and your article shed a huge amount of light on my new project! Also, as boomer, very fond of Leonard Cohen, wonderful to learn about his contribution to this quote. Now is the time to keep it real!

Well Rumi said wrote something very similar about 500 years before either of these two. There expressing an all expressing the similar I insight into the nature of the human experience. I would have thought a discussion as to the truth, meaning and implication If this insight would be more worthwhile than pedantically splitting hairs of the provenance. Guess what: 80% of famous quotations are misappropriated but I think find your focus on the entomology kinda misses the point. There may be something is faking why these have become misremember cultural memes / artifices in the first place?